SYDNEY, Nov. 6, 2013 /PRNewswire/ -- Novogen Limited
(Australian Securities Exchange: NRT and NASDAQ: NVGN), an
Australian biotechnology company dedicated to developing drugs that
provide long-term remission through the successful control of
cancer stem cells, today announced a joint venture with
Yale University dedicated to developing
personalized approaches to chemotherapy to fight ovarian
cancer.
The joint venture, which will be based near Yale's campus in New
Haven, CT, will be known as CanTx, Inc. Novogen will own 85%
of the new company and Novogen CEO Graham
Kelly, PhD will be CEOoft the new joint venture as well. The
CanTx Board will be comprised of directors representing both
Novogen and Yale.
CanTx will assume responsibility for advancing Novogen's
super-benzopyran drug technology into the clinic for the treatment
of ovarian cancer. CanTx's first development candidate, designed to
seek out cancer cells and deliver a payload of a Novogen drug that
has been shown to be highly cytotoxic against ovarian cancer cells
including ovarian cancer stem cells, is expected to enter clinical
studies in 2014. The investigational product will be administered
intra-peritoneally to women with ovarian cancer.
"There have been no new therapies for ovarian cancer in the last
30 years and a fresh approach is urgently needed," said
Gil Mor, M.D., Ph.D., Professor of
Obstetrics and Gynecology and Reproductive Science at Yale University School of Medicine. "Current
chemotherapy unfortunately only does half the job. It is reasonably
effective at killing the predominant somatic cancer cells, but by
not killing the source of the cancer, the cancer stem cells, the
cancer is highly likely to recur."
Dr. Mor, who will co-lead clinical development efforts for
CanTx, is the first researcher in the world to isolate ovarian
cancer stem cells, the cells responsible for the initial growth of
ovarian tumors and their recurrence following chemotherapy.
"Around 70% of ovarian cancer patients who respond to first
round chemotherapy will eventually experience tumor recurrence,"
Dr. Mor added. "Our research with the Novogen super-benzopyran
family of drugs shows a high degree of activity against ovarian
cancer stem cells where no other approach has worked in our
experience to date. We believe that by combining this powerful new
personalized approach with our unique drug delivery model, we may
be able to treat ovarian cancer and prevent its recurrence."
Dr. Mor and his team have developed an innovative targeted
delivery system for that allows the entire dose of the injected
drug to reach the intended target in mice. Typically, when
anti-cancer drugs are injected intravenously, approximately 3% of
the drug actually reaches the tumor. With this new delivery system,
it is anticipated that virtually all injected drug will reach its
target.
"This joint venture with Yale brings
a level of expertise, resources and firepower that is unique in the
field of ovarian cancer," said Dr. Kelly. "This program will be the
first in the world that I am aware of that is dedicated to finding
an effective treatment for ovarian cancer, with the advantage that
promising treatments are capable of being moved quickly into
clinical studies in months instead of years."
The longer-term goal is to go one step further and provide
personalized chemotherapy approaches that matches the best
chemotherapy to the individual.
"To achieve this lofty goal, you need two fundamentals: on the
one hand, the ability to extract the cancer stem cells from an
individual cancer in order to assess the sensitivity of an
individual tumor to drugs; on the other hand, to have the drugs
that can be modified to work across individual tumor genotypes,"
Dr. Kelly added. "Yale and Novogen are
uniquely positioned to leverage these fundamentals and is why they
have joined forces to combat this deadly disease. Yale has the expertise in cancer stem cells
culture; Novogen has the drug technology capable of killing these
tumor-initiating cells."
Under this joint venture arrangement, Novogen retains full
ownership of its drug technology intellectual property (IP) and
will grant CanTx access to that IP for drug development purposes.
Novogen will continue to explore applications of the same
technology platform in a range of other clinical indications
including glioblastoma, along with its anti-tropomyosin drug
technology in the areas of prostate cancer, melanoma and
neuroblastoma.
About Ovarian Cancer
The American Cancer Society estimates that over 22,000 women
will be diagnosed with ovarian cancer during 2013 and 14,230
American women will die from the disease. It ranks fifth in cancer
deaths among women, accounting for more deaths than any other
cancer of the female reproductive system. This cancer mainly
develops in older women. About half of the women who are diagnosed
with ovarian cancer are 63 years or older. It is more common in
white women that African-American women.
About Novogen
Novogen Ltd is a public Australian biotechnology company whose
shares trade on both the Australian Stock Exchange (symbol 'NRT')
and NASDAQ (symbol 'NVGN'). The Company is based in Sydney, Australia and is focused on the
development of novel anti-cancer drugs based on two proprietary
drug technologies -- the super-benzopyran chemical family and
anti-tropomyosin drug technology.
About Cancer Stem Cells
Cancer stem cells are thought to be the tumor-initiating cells
in many cancers responsible for both the production of the tumor
mass and metastasis. Cancer stem cells have been confirmed in both
ovarian cancers and glioblastoma. These cells are highly resistant
to chemotherapy and radiotherapy, a property thought responsible
for tumor recurrence following successful initial therapy.
Contact details
Dr Graham Kelly, Chief Executive
Officer
Tel: +61-2-9476-0344
Fax: +61-2-9476 0388
Mobile: +61-0429-854-390
16-20 Edgeworth David Ave Hornsby NSW
2077 AUSTRALIA
PO Box 2333 Hornsby Westfield NSW
1635 AUSTRALIA
Email: graham.kelly@novogen.com
Web: www.novogen.com
USA media contact
David Cary
Lazar Partners
+212-867-1768
SOURCE Novogen